well-crafted – Page 4

Free and legal MP3: Sea of Bees (rumbly, minor-key goodness)

Rich, deep, and flowing, “Marmalade” has the rumble of some muddy, alt-rock classic, complete with rubbed-out vocals and a battery of guitar sounds, from fuzzy-growly to acoustic-strummy to lonesome-seering. For all the ground-level noise and minor-key darkness, however, the song lifts and soars most wonderfully. It’s an intriguing effect.

“Marmalade” – Sea of Bees

Julie Ann Bee’s voice is central to “Marmalade”‘s appeal. Even as she buries the brighter and quirkier aspects of her singing under the song’s portentous textures, she doesn’t give in to cliched howling–an impressive feat especially as the song features plenty of wordless “oh-oh”-ing, which lord knows could’ve been howled. Instead she plays to a dusky quality in her voice that you almost don’t hear here but in almost not hearing it’s all the more engaging. I think. Meanwhile, listen to how the various guitars combine into an almost orchestral unity of purpose. Not a sound is wasted; propelled by a swift, unstinting rhythm and its plaintive minor key, the song is a fast, involving ride, ending, each time I listen, before I quite expect it.

“Marmalade” is from Sea of Bees’ debut full-length CD, Songs For The Ravens, released last month on Crossbill Records. Sea of Bees is a musical project masterminded and performed by the Sacramento-based Bee (nee Baenzinger), with an assist from producer John Baccigaluppi and a few guests.

Free and legal MP3: Port O’Brien (instantly likable but still slightly unusual)

“Sour Milk/Salt Water” – Port O’Brien

Strummy, lyrically insistent verses, with double-tracked vocals, alternate with a plaintive chorus, lyrics now moving at half the pace of the music, vocals still double-tracked but now in an almost Neil Young-like upper register. And while the whole thing is pretty simple sounding at one level it’s mysteriously compelling at another–both instantly likable and slightly unusual.

Or maybe it’s not so mysterious, just well-crafted. Even as the lyrics topple out in the mode of a one-note harangue (a la “Subterranean Homesick Blues”), the music actually shifts between two notes, one-half step apart–it starts on a B, goes up to C, then back to B. Check it out and try to focus on how the underlying chords, which go back and forth from major to minor, shift each time just ahead of when the note itself changes. The end result is a wonderful sort of musical sleight of hand, delivering at once the intensity of a one-note verse and the involvement of a melody. The effect is enhanced by the way the song takes advantage of how aurally distinct two chords can be that are built around notes separated by just a half step.

Port O’Brien is a quintet from northern California with roots in Alaska as well–founders Van Pierszalowski and Cambria Goodwin spend summers on Kodiak Island, Pierszalowski working on a commercial fishing boat with his father, Goodwin as the town baker. Suddenly the title of the song makes a bit more sense, eh? “Sour Milk/Salt Water” will be found on the album Threadbare, the band’s second full-length, due out in October on TBD Records. MP3 via City Slang, a Berlin-based label that releases a lot of American indie rock in Europe. Thanks to Largehearted Boy for the head’s up.

Free and legal MP3: Deer Tick (gruff but lovable quasi-Americana)

“Easy” – Deer Tick

For a band with roots in Rhode Island, this one has something of the big, lonesome prairie about it, provided that you put a garage somewhere in the middle of that prairie and plugged a guitar or two into it. We’ll need a drum kit too. And a carton of cigarettes.

After the spaghetti western surf rock of the rumbly introduction, the immediate thing that will impress you (or, not) about “Easy” is the roughened—well, okay, strangled—tone of front man John Joseph McCauley III. Perhaps an acquired taste, or perhaps something you won’t want to hear for more than three or four minutes at a time, but I urge you to ride this one out because the thing that ultimately gives this song its power is, I think, the juxtaposition of McCauley’s sore-throated rasp and the urgent poise of its simple, well-crafted music. Listen to how the galloping verses leave you aching for resolution and how well the rock-solid chorus delivers it: an uncomplicated melody perched upon a flowing guitar line, everything shot through with the deep-seated authenticity of folk music, along with a shot of un-self-conscious ’70s southern rock.

Deer Tick began in 2004 as pretty much just McCauley, supported by a variety of side musicians. The band became a duo in ’07, and has evolved since then to a full-fledged quartet, now based in Brooklyn, like everybody else. “Easy” is the lead track off Deer Tick’s second album, Born on Flag Day, which will be released next month on Partisan Records, also based in Brooklyn. MP3 originally via Partisan, now via Better Propaganda.

Free and legal MP3: Chester French (the Zombies meet Fountains of Wayne at the disco)

“She Loves Everybody” – Chester French

Up-to-date pop pastiche-ism from a Harvard-educated, L.A.-based twosome, underscored by an affable, Fountains of Wayne-like mixture of irony, pathos, and craft. “Well she craves affection/So I use protection” could be a line straight from the Adam and Chris songbook, while the music offers up an intriguing, FoW-like blend of the ’60s, ’80s, and ’00s, and maybe a few other decades besides.

From the start, this one’s a mutt: seven seconds of string quartet tension mashes into a disco-y echo of “Time of the Season,” with sleigh bells and surf guitar. The verses strip down to a beat-driven duo-friendly groove; a melodramatic piano appears, out of the blue, to usher us into a two-part chorus that is half laptop, half pounding ’80s album rock, with lyrics simultaneously goofy and meaningful. An offbeat instrumental interlude then brings us back to the original groove. In the middle of the musical parade, note the unintentional (by the narrator) intentional (by the songwriter) irony of the central, seemingly breezy lyrical conceit: “And I know she loves me/She loves everybody.”

“She Loves Everybody” is the title track to the duo’s debut EP, released digitally this week, and on CD next week, on Star Trak/Interscope. The song first made a splash last summer when it was featured on the HBO series Entourage. The band takes its name from the sculptor Daniel Chester French, who designed the statue of John Harvard in Harvard Yard, as well as the Lincoln statue in the Lincoln Memorial.

Free and legal MP3: The Bittersweets

Well-crafted alt-country, with great vocals

“Wreck” – the Bittersweets

Hannah Prater has a voice made to sing the words, “Why’d ya go and wreck this all?”: firm but with a little crack to it, at once bright and dusky, hurt and resilient and maybe a little existentially exasperated too. Why’d ya go and wreck this all? She’s sad, and disappointed, and pissed off, and her rich tone nicely captures the overlay of emotions independent, even, of what she’s saying. Over the Rhine fans should pay particular note; Prater sings with something of Karin Bergquist’s idiosyncratic verve, and “Wreck,” come to think of it, does have the vibe and polish of one of OTR’s smooth, capable rockers.

And make no mistake: smooth and well-crafted it is, from the gratifying melodies of the verse and the release of the chorus to the precisely played instrumental parts laid down by guitarist and keyboard player Chris Meyers (the group’s main songwriter) and drummer Steve Bowman (who has played with Counting Crows, among others). Interesting how the “indie” umbrella by 2008 gathers in everything from buzzy, jarring lo-fi to well-produced, radio-ready numbers such as the Bittersweets play. The irony, as music aficionados know, is that the internet all but overflows with radio-ready songs that few if any terrestrial radio stations are in fact ready to play. Blame deregulation in this case too; and I only wish that were a joke.

“Wreck” is from the Nashville-based trio’s second CD, Goodnight San Francisco, which was released this month on Compass Records. ~~MP3 via Compass.~~